Muslim-convert preachers in Indonesia : religious authority, Biblical texts, and Muslim's acceptance

Abstract

This research examines the emergence of Muslim preachers with the background of muallaf (converts) who formerly served as religious figures in Christianty as the newly emerging group in contemporary Indonesian Islam. Their emergence challenges the 'mainstream' Islamic religious authority which common Islamic preachers were Muslim-born. Muslim-Convert Preachers also provide Biblical text materials which are not common in general Islamic preachings. In this project, they are called Muslim-Convert Preachers. This study demonstrates the use of Biblical texts and converts status in sermons of Muslim-Convert Preachers as the source of alternative religious authority. The research focuses on a former nun Irena Handono and a former Christian priest Menachem Ali who represent two different dominant approaches in the use of Biblical texts. The study draws on ethnographic fieldwork for approximately four months (February-May) through digital observation, interviews, content analysis, and documentation. Interviews were conducted with Handono and Ali to dig for more information about their stories and motives of conversion and preaching, while interviews with five followers of each preacher were to discover the reason they follow those preachers and their attitude towards Biblical texts after following the preaching. Through content analysis and digital observation, the research studies the narrative and approach that both preachers present in the use of Biblical texts in either Islamic preachings or podcasts on YouTube social media. The data is analyzed using Alatas' (2021) theory of articulatory labor and Scheppele and Soltan's (1987) theory of authority of alternatives. This thesis found that Biblical texts are approached in two ways. While the first name commonly uses in the polemical approach to criticizing Christianity, the second one which relies prefers the apologetic one to connect Quranic revelation to the former revelation. This research argues that the use of Biblical texts is the main and first element to establish Islamic religious authority by Muslim-Convert Preachers through interest and then articulated with polemical and apologetic approaches that ultimately have an impact on increasing the Islamic faith of their followers and their knowledge of tahrif (corruption) in the Bible.